Category: VMAX

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Virtual Storage Integrator: Symmetrix SRA Utilities 5.6

Late last week I posted a summary blog on the latest SRDF Storage Replication Adapter for VMware Site Recovery Manager here:

https://www.codyhosterman.com/2013/10/25/updated-srdf-storage-replication-adapter-released-for-srm-5-5/

I detailed out the new features etc for the 5.5 release and briefly mentioned the latest release of the Virtual Storage Integrator Symmetrix SRA Utilities that helps users configure the SRDF SRA. On 10/25, we posted the latest release of the SRA Utilities, version 5.6.

Version 5.6 of the SRA Utilities have been enhanced in tandem with the SRDF SRA to support the new features that the SRA has to offer. Most of these enhancements relate to the masking control functionality that is newly supported by the SRA.

isntallvsi

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Updated SRDF Storage Replication Adapter released for SRM 5.5

Today EMC posted the updated SRDF Storage Replication Adapter (SRA) 5.5 for Symmetrix VMAX arrays to their website:

https://download.emc.com/downloads/DL49914_EMCSRDFSRA_5.5.0.0.exe.exe

It will be on VMware’s site shortly:

https://my.vmware.com/web/vmware/details?downloadGroup=SRM_SRA&productId=357&rPId=4220

This adapter includes support for VMware vCenter Site Recovery Manager 5.5 (as well as “legacy” support for SRM 5.1).

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Updated Symmetrix with VMware TechBook for vSphere 5.5

As some of you are aware, myself and my colleague Drew Tonnesen (@drewtonnesen) write and update an EMC document called Using EMC Symmetrix Storage in VMware vSphere Environments. This document is what we call a “TechBook”. Essentially a very detailed explanation of the best practices of using VMware with Symmetrix storage as well as overviews of integration points. If you are using Symmetrix and VMware this is a document you should use/know.

techbook cover

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Virtual Storage Integrator 5.6: VPLEX Provisioning

I’m (Drew Tonnesen, @drewtonnesen) back for another guest post, this time continuing Cody’s theme of VSI 5.6.  Besides the much anticipated (and long awaited) striped meta capability in Unified Storage Management (USM) 5.6 for VMAX, there is now VPLEX provisioning!  For those of us who use VPLEX with VMware this simplifies the creation of datastores on VPLEX.

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Virtual Storage Integrator 5.6: Provisioning VMAX Striped Metas

Hey all! So as many of you have heard we (EMC) has released the latest version of the Virtual Storage Integrator today (September 16th 2013). There are plenty of blogs/posts that go into all of the details of the new release so I will not regurgitate all of that here. But for those of you who have not seen these posts check them out at these links:

http://itzikr.wordpress.com/2013/09/10/virtual-storage-integrator-5-6-is-ga-grab-it-while-its-hot/

https://community.emc.com/community/connect/everything_vmware/blog/2013/09/16/virtual-storage-integrator-56–whats-new

UPDATE: See a full video demo by Drew Tonnesen (@drewtonnesen) here:

https://community.emc.com/videos/6222

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New VMAX Enginuity Release 5876.251 and Solutions Enabler 7.6.1

On September 9th EMC released a new SR for Enginuity 5876.251. For the most part this is a variety of fixes and minor enhancements but there is one new hardware feature of note. VMAX has introduced support for 16 Gb FC I/O Modules. So if you have some hosts that are using 16 GB HBAs and want to make full use of them you are gonna want this Enginuity upgrade. Of course you will still have to purchase new front end ports for the VMAX as the current FC ports will not be the correct hardware to support 16 GB.

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EMC Storage Analytics (ESA) 2.0 with VMAX arrays

So I (Drew Tonnesen, @drewtonnesen) am guest blogging again here at Cody’s site.  I’ll add my name now in the beginning to avoid the confusion (yes there has been) that this post isn’t from Cody but given the blog URL I suppose it is inevitable no matter what I do.  And since I am not starting my own blog which would more likely contain hints on how to avoid going insane with kids (yes alcohol helps) I trust the readers can figure it out.  On to the post…

I’ve been working on this new release for EMC Storage Analytics (ESA) 2.0 for what seems like ages now.  The first two releases of ESA (1.0, 1.5) supported the VNX  platforms.  The 2.0 release is the first with VMAX support!  As the Symmetrix engineering contact for the VMAX component of ESA, I have had first-hand input and testing of the product, along with putting together a good part of the documentation.  This post jumps the gun a little as the product will be officially revealed next week at VMworld but what’s a little pre-announcement among friends?  I’ll give a brief run-down of the release below.

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Changing the default IOPS value for VMware Round Robin and Symmetrix Devices

A common recommendation from storage vendors is to change the default IOPS setting for VMwares’ Native Multi-Pathing (NMP) Path Selection Policy (PSP) Round Robin. The IOPS setting controls how many I/Os are sent down a single logical path before switching to the next path. By default this number is 1,000 I/Os. The VMAX recommendation is to set this to 1. The purpose of this blog post is not to debate the setting, but to help those who want to use it. Regardless, I have seen many customers benefit from this recommendation. Once they see a benefit they want to know–can I make this setting a default?

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Expanding a Symmetrix Striped Metavolume

This is a topic that I get asked about a lot and a recent internal email thread prompted me to write a post about it. On a Symmetrix array if you want a volume larger than 240 GB you need to create a metavolume. When creating a metavolume you have two configuration choices; concatenated or striped. There are many benefits to striped over concatenated (all of them performance-related) but one disadvantage. Due to their nature striped metavolumes are harder to expand. Until a few years ago thin striped metas couldn’t even be expanded online. So the decision was easy–do you think you will need to expand or not. In Enginuity 5875 and Solutions Enabler online expansion of striped metavolumes was allowed.

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EMC Storage Integrator 3.0 released!

Today (August 14th 2013) EMC released the latest version of the EMC Storage Integrator, version 3.0. I blogged about ESI a few weeks back and the PowerShell cmdlets that it offered:

https://www.codyhosterman.com/2013/07/29/scripting-esi-powershell-cmdlets-and-vmware/

This release fills in some of the gaps that were present in earlier versions–especially when it comes to VMAX storage provisioning. The flagship features of this release though are:

  • Mailbox provisioning for Microsoft Exchange
  • Database Availability Group (DAG) support with native or EMC RecoverPoint replication
  • Storage control activities for Microsoft System Center Orchestrator.

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